Decolonization and Afro-Feminism

Abstract

If I could, I would introduce Sylvia Tamale with singing and dancing – an aptly Afro-Feminist way to honour an author whose reputation as a thinker, scholar, and activist is renowned. She stands on the shoulders of her ancestors and dedicates her book to Wanafunzi wa Afrika (the students of Africa), for whom this is a rare and valuable gift. Decolonization and Afro-Feminism is an epic testament to Tamale’s courageous political and intellectual rigour, it imagines a world with reconfigured social institutions that restore dignity to African people. Although much of her formal training and work has been in law, Tamale’s activism and scholarship have crossed many disciplinary boundaries, notably in the fields of gender and sexuality, jurisprudence, and politics, all with an African feminist framing. Decolonization and Afro-Feminism brings together all of these interests in a textual and empirical analysis of colonialism’s effects and their potential undoing.